How daily life has changed in the last 30 years

If on January 24th 1984, the day the Macintosh computer came out, I slipped into a coma or through a time warp so that the next thing I knew it was 30 years later in New York City, how would things seem different?

The most surprising thing is that things are pretty much the same. No shiny science fiction future, no Blade Runner world either. Just the same old stuff with some differences.

Money: The money looks somewhat different. Prices have doubled.

20 dollar bill from 1981

20 dollar bill from 2008

New York: The subway trains are nicer. So is Times Square. The Twin Towers are gone. There is another building in their place. Strange. The city seems to have more wealth and confidence, but poverty is still high.

New York subway train, c. 1980

New York subway train, 2013

Race: New York is about as black as it ever was, but it has become more Asian and Hispanic and less white (from a half to a third of the city). On the other hand, Harlem is whiter. Whites seem more racist, especially:

The police stop and search blacks and Latinos more than they used to.

Cars: look more streamlined. Many have no trunk.

New York taxi, 1983

New York taxi, 2013

Colour screens are everywhere. They no longer require a heavy box that sits on a table.

Telephones no longer ring a loud bell. They are wireless and can fit in your pocket. Most people have one. They look at them even when they are not talking to anyone.

telephone, 1980

telephone, 2010

Video games are far more realistic looking and far more common.

video game, 1983

video game, 2013

Computers have pretty much become what Steve Jobs wanted in 1983:

[W]e want to put an incredibly great computer in a book that you can carry around with you and learn how to use in 20 minutes … and we really want to do it with a radio link in it so you don’t have to hook up to anything and you’re in communication with all of these larger databases and other computers.

In 2014 the radio link is called Wi-Fi, and the “larger databases and other computers” are called the Internet. Email is common.

Steve Jobs introduces the Macintosh, 1984

Steve Jobs introduces the iPad, 2010

How to look stuff up: From library card catalogues to Google on the Internet.

search engine, circa 1984

search engine, 2014

Television: Everyone has cable television. There are tons of channels and they rarely go off the air. Animation and graphics are better.There are more ads, contest shows, partisan news and news comedies. American television seems as white as it ever was.

Music: Rap is much more common. Even white people listen to it.

Top R&B song on January 24th:

1984: Patti LaBelle: If Only You Knew

2014: Beyoncé featuring Jay Z: Drunk in Love

Patti LaBelle, 1983

Beyonce, 2014

Cameras do not need film.

The New York Times has colour photos.

New York Times, 1983

New York Times, 2013

Magazines: Layout and graphics are better, writing more bite-sized. The skin of women in pictures sometimes looks strangely smooth.

214 Responses

Great post, Abagond. It is rare that I comment on your blog anymore because there is way too much White commenters and some of the commenters get on my nerves. Anyways I completely agree with this post because not much has changed since the 1980s except we have technology such as IPADs, IPODs, laptops, digital television. I wasn’t alive in the 1980s being apart of the younger generation but I don’t see much difference between the 1980s and 2010s.

Google’s director of engineering, Ray Kurzweil, managed to predict the fall of the Soviet Union, the rise of the Internet, the defeat of the leading chess master by a computer, the completion of the Human Genome Project, the introduction of tablet computers, WiFi, and mobile devices. This is based off the predictable trend that information technology has followed for over half a century. I’m looking forward to self-driving cars in a few years.

Perhaps sooner on the self driving car part. I do believe a test model has been put out by google so far. I personally am not looking forward to that. A part of me feels it is creating a trend of laziness.

Someone was telling me about an “Anti Wrinkle Clinic”, and a non-surgical liquid facelift. Injections in the face is quite a new thing.
It makes me think that the pharmaceutical industry has penetrated our lives in a way it didn’t before. I also remember a time when I’d see naturally grey-haired women, now I only see this among the very senior in age.

Who would have thought that design could have such power?
Perhaps I first felt that when I saw pictures of Frank Lloyd Wright’s “Falling Water” house, a large house built over a waterfall.

I think that the designer, Jonathan Ive, has — perhaps singlehandedly — changed how everyday objects look and feel.
He designed the IPod, iPhone, Apple ear pods, etc.
These things are so sleek and smooth, no bulk or hard edges.
Consumer products are another world.

“The music industry is not what it once was, too.”—I agree and I think (just throwing this idea out there) that it all comes down to being marketable and not really talent. Making money has really become top priority in todays society. It is sad, but considering I have been buying up all the music I love on mp3 from old (thank goodness it is still available) I am all good.

@ Sharina — true words. Sure, the music industry or business has always been about the business and the industry over and above the music — but it HAS changed, for the worse — in just the way you say.
(I kind of miss going into a record / CD shop and browsing in all the sections that I don’t know anything about!)

One remarkable thing would be to note how fashion slowed down to a crawl somewhere in the 1990s so that you could easily wear many clothed from 1994 today, and they would not even look a day out of place.

King, interiors have changed. Perhaps more people care more about that now, than before?

I think interior design has moved on in the last decades, because I believe as “design” it has gained greater respectability and became a growth business.
A really big one.
As a result, I believe many more interior architects and designers work with a surer hand, for example, fusing shabby chic with industrial:

Or take the work of Vincente Wolf, for instance, who will source something Ethiopian, or Rajastani, with 1940s North American furniture and make it work, and this influence has been far-reaching:

“I kind of miss going into a record / CD shop and browsing in all the sections that I don’t know anything about.”—Those were the days I simply took for granted. I don’t even think we have record/Cd shops anymore. 😦

Some people may deny the ability of philosophy to “change daily life” (Im not one of them) but one change Ive noticed in the last 30 years is how the historical research of people like Diop, Massey, Bernal, Clark… is no longer dismissed as “afrocentric negro babble”. To the contrary, it is now often embraced and white people give TED talks and produce PHD papers on the African origins and contributions to civilization.

Im pretty sure white people already knew much of this information. But with the advent of the internet, even a broke black person could do their own research and EVEN find the European sources that back up things the so called “Afro centrists” say/said

Many of these black history researchers died broke because there was never much/any money in revealing this information to black people; in addition to the lack of “paid positions” available for black people to pay their bills while they conducted this important work on the side (like white people are able to do).

For example, I saw Runoko Rashidi give a slide presentation at a “little hole in the wall” black book store back in the 80s. He had to spend a lot of his own money to travel and do that kind of research.

Then drive around giving presentations in order to sell his book. People like this have a tremendous amount of energy; and they had better; because very few people are going to help them. There is a name for people like that?

Like I said, you may not think it impacts “daily life” but people change their behavior once you know, that they know, that you know; and once they know, that you know, that they know.

I must point out that vaccines’ benefits are taken for granted. During my stay in Europe, a measles outbreak occurred, in part, due to the low vaccination rate and most of my classmates got sick and were stuck at home for weeks. I was protected by the MMR vaccine so I was fine. You can imagine my relief. Measles has been eradicated in North and South America, so Americans often take for granted the protections they have from many harmful diseases. Of particular interest is smallpox, from which hundreds of millions of lives have been saved thanks to complete eradication by vaccination.

You didn’t have to subscribe to cable to see major sporting events. You didn’t really have to “pay” for TV at all.

Winter and Summer Olympics occurred in the same year.

The best (or most popular) shows on television played on one of three television networks.

Listening to music was a social occasion — you could (and often did) invite your friends over just to listen to the latest Michael Jackson, Prince, Earth, Wind and Fire or Eagles album. You’d pass the album cover around, marvel at its art, read the lyrics that appeared on the jacket. Ear buds and digital downloads have pretty much done away with recorded music as a purely social event — unless it’s a party or concert, people don’t congregate to listen to music any more.

“Public” meant free (or fairly cheap), open to all during a wide range of hours, and easily accessible, regardless of whether it was a school, college, park, library, museum, transit system, or other entity.

Shoulder pads were big, but hair was bigger. And it was kind of the first time you began to see colored hair that was intentional, and not a dye job gone bad. Green hair and mohawks weren’t as popular among young folks as they are today, but that was the first time styles like that weren’t considered weird or out of the ordinary.

Countries such as South Korea, China, India, Ireland, and Brazil were not regarded as technologically or industrially…significant.

Geopolitical concerns mostly centered around the U.S./Western Europe vs. the Soviet Union/Eastern Europe, while Asia, Latin America, and Africa were given scant attention.

30 years ago the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia existed, and South Sudan was still part of Sudan, Qaddafi was still alive, there was no ‘war on terror’, being Muslim in America was a lot easier, nobody had ever heard about Pakistan or Afghanistan, Airport security was really lax and compared to now civil liberties were respected, nobody thought America would have a Black President thirty years later, nobody expected a Pope from the Americas.

There exists the belief that menthol cigarettes are more addicting and more difficult to quit than regular cigarettes. There also exists a stereotypical notion that Blacks (and Hispanics) have some sort of a ‘thing’ for mentholated cigarettes….

I myself quit cold turkey just over 5 years ago, and found it surprisingly easy to do so. However, if there had never been such a thing as a menthol cigarette in the first place, I probably would never have become a smoker. Plain tobacco.tastes just awful to me.

Agabond, you’re still killing it. Excellent post after excellent post. I rarely comment because of shortage of time, but I read you regularly, almost always learn something, and usually leave your joint with something to think about (even if I disagree with you, which happens less often than you’d probably expect).

I don’t agree. The silhouette (in men’s clothing anyway) is much tighter right now. The 90210 link shows a very loose silhouette, it’s very out of place, that is to say, dated”

Ahh, you speak of the “slim fit suit” effect. But most of the suits sold in 2013 were not slim fit suits by a long shot. For one thing, for it to look right, you kind of need a certain narrow frame. Also, people 50 and older aren’t keen on what they consider “the tight fit suit.” Many friends of mine think a suit that is too snug simply looks gay, and since they are straight, they don’t wear them. I’ll allow that they have had some overall effect on silhouettes, but the change is far from dramatic.

Again this is a suit from 1997, a full 16 years ago!

This is a skim fit suit from last year

In the shame of fashion, its AMAZING that a 16 year old suit looks so close to it’s modern equivalent.

I’m sorry but your escalator analogy is really absurd. The facts about vaccines are readily available. If you want to be anti-vax, or are looking for a reason, however dubious, to be anti-vax you’re entitled to your opinion. There’s no need to pretend that there’s some mysterious “1% issues” holding you back.

C’mon now, that was just a sideways response to Kiwi’s point about vaccines. Saying that any event in life carries risk and opportunity is a self evident but meaningless or as lawyers might say “non-responsive” response. Especially when you use an unfortunate but, very one off example as evidence and when you state that there is some issue with transparency (regarding vaccines) when there is not.

Very interesting pictures of the suits. The only really noticable difference is the width of the lapels and height of the first jacket button.

I agree with your friends about the too tight suits. Unless you have a very specific body style, you wind up looking like a sausage stuffed into a too small casing which makes the makes the too short jacket sleeves and high water pants look even worse!

Well, a thin-fit suit can look good on a thin-built guy, but there are variations on the styling that can make even thin guys look unnecessarily waif-like. As for guys with more significant muscle mass, it’s just impossible, and of course overweight … well, just doesn’t go with “slim fit” anyway.

Slim Fits

Neat, rather than baggy/sloppy

Liable to be absolutely embarrassing in photo albums 6 years from now.

Thinking about stuff in 1984. I was living in Detroit. Saw and rode a “mountain bike” for the first time. Most people had never heard of one nor seen one. Saw a then probably 16- or 17-year old Regina Carter tearing it up Jean Luc Ponty style in various clubs around Detroit. Break dancing/”hip hop” were the brand new thing, mostly via bootleg cassettes mailed from friends back east. Reagan was POTUS. Nobody had computers or cell phones at home. There was no TSA at airports.

I miss walkmans, I miss the 90’s. The 90’s were the best time to be young. MTV singled out, celebrity de@thmatch, fanatic, the first seasons of the real world, the vmas. We had everything from Moesha to Sister sister, Clueless and the boyband era, conscious Hip hop was big, the pseudo intellectual (I’m intelligent because I drink coffee am anti commercial and wear flannel shirts) indie rock era. I think in many ways, advances in technology have separated us as human beings. We don’t have robots like many people thought we would, but we have become them.

Yeah they are indeed too big but it’s horrible compared to um…satorial splendor…that was George Jefferson. Man that 70s era stuff was something else. The humongous shirt collars worn on top of the airplane winger sized suit lapels…

You admitted you do not know what’s in vaccines and called them “toxic” in the same sentence. That kind of monumental ignorance mixed with hints of a conspiracy theory is tin foil hat worthy. The fact that you are also anti-GMO is like a cherry on top.

in my opinion the most relevant global trend from 1950 up to now and with all likelihood at leat up to 2100 is the population explosion in subsharaafrica. For example 1980 the number of children born in nigeria was around 12 percent of te children born in india. in 2012 it thias number has risen to 25 percent, and it will most likely grow further.
please excuse my bad english, as i am no native speaker

so I see the newport cigarette ads are still aimed at black people smh.
Another thing that has changed is mcdonalds is everywhere and so is walmart. walmart went from walmart to a walmart supercenter selling pretty much everything. 2 dollar bills are gone.
I noticed pay phones were gone too, and also Hollywood video and a lot of other video stores are gone as well and we now have redbox and netfilix.
rated r and pg13 movies are more graphic than back then.

it is hard trying to find a cd player as well. I still have movies on vcr tapes, lol I remember when the tapes used to get stuck or break me and my brother would unwind the tape and run around with it through the house. the hot comb has changed too, went from being a hot comb u had to heat up on the stove or the electric one to flat irons. Things are not as heavy either, irons and cars are not as tough. and no water beds.

the Walkman was good, but kind of bulky, oh and I miss when my song would come on the radio having to hurry up and record it on tape ,those were the days. I remember my boombox, It was more portable than the stereo systems they have now. my dad told me how they used to carry the boombox on their shoulders or attach it to their bikes lol.

Anyway, even if a kind of GMO is bad for you that doesn’t mean they all are. They may just be the thing that will save millions of people from starvation. It seems to me that many people simply believe in the magic power of labels – that when something is called ‘organic’ it’s automatically good for you, is more nutritious or even tastes better.

This obviously is not a proper study, but the reactions are predictable:
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Zqe4ZV9LDs)
People never truly know what they are eating, but simply calling something ‘GMO’ has negative connotation that are not really based on science.

Another thing that was fun was when u had to record shows on vcr tape because there was no dvr back then and somebody else accidently records over ur show. it starts off then flips to sports like wtf, who the heck recorded over my cartoon.

Although I haven’t read through the posts regarding the discussion on vaccines, I must say, I’m very sceptical on the safety of vaccines.

Exert “The Maker’s Diet” by Jordan S. Rubin

“Despite massive media and government public relations campaigns to the contrary, certain childhood immunisation injections may pose considerable risks to children. Most adults today received one to five immunisations in childhood, but school children today receive an average of twenty-two or more immunisations-most of them administered while the brain and nervous system are still developing!” An epidemic of juvenile autism and other neurological and developmental disorders sweeping through America’s school aged children generally coincides with the introduction of certain mandatory immunisations. A growing body of scientific and medical research appears to link this dangerous health trend to these childhood immunisations. Vijendra K. Singh, Ph.D., an eminent neuroimmunologist from the Department of Biology and Biotechnology Centre at Utah State University, hypothesized in research published internationally “that a measles virus-induced autoimmune response is a casual factor in autism, whereas HHV-6 via co-infection may contribute to pathophysiology of the disorder. Although as yet unproven, I think it is an excellent working hypothesis to explain autism, and it may also help us understand why some children show autistic regression after the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) immunisation. Dr Singh’s findings seem to confirm the results of a similar study published in the Lancet in 1998 by Dr. Andrew Wakefield and co-workers of the Royal Free Hospital in London, indicating a possible link between MMR vaccination, Crohn’s disease of the bowel, and autism.”
………………….
It’s one of those controversial personal call things. I remember Jenny Mcarthy saying her son’s autism developed after a vaccination.

Man, my vcr just broke down a few weeks back, after watching “Poetic Justice.” I’m gonna get a new one, while I’m quite happy to purchase DVD’s, I simply refuse to throw out all my videotapes. It’s like visual vinyl to me, I love the flawed quality.

@Kiwi re Ray Kurzweil,
of course no predictions about what really matters like an end or serious reduction in poverty ,illness and crime ,or maybe these things don’t concern wealthy white males who got most of their wealth from crime.

@Matari
excellent observations.

@thwack
when I first saw your username and response to my comment I thought – nutjob just ignore,
however this comment here of yours contains some profound and astute observations,even the very last part.

If I look back to Jan. 1984, by far the biggest impact is the personal computer. In Jan 1984, I didn’t know any families that had one at home. Offices just started to put one in. Many people had to share one, as they were learning to use DOS to operate one. Wordprocessing was just just moving off typewriters to diskettes and data entry onto punch cards and reel-to-reel tapes was just starting to phase out in 1984.

They were just starting to come out with digital rolodexes and address books, but it would still be a few years before they would be popular.

CDs were new. VHS had just become popular and people were learning how to record their programs off the TV.

People still weren’t using email yet and we were still using real carbon copies and post things in envelopes. But ATM machinese were already popular by 1984.

@thwack
when I first saw your username and response to my comment I thought – nutjob just ignore,
however this comment here of yours contains some profound and astute observations,even the very last part.
————————————————————————————————–

I started thinking on this topic when I saw an outdoor payphone last week. It was decrepit. Just sitting on the edge of some old parking lot. I remember thinking to myself that you couldn’t get me to put my mouth next to one of those things today. But back then we thought nothing about doing that.

We’re a lot more germ-phobic then 30 years ago. We wipe everything down now, like shopping carts and door handles. We never thought about stuff like that when I was a child. Now they have special wipes for the shopping carts in the stores.

There’s more and less variety to foods. There’s certainly more varieties of junk food ,including “healthy” snacks. Those didn’t exist 30 years ago.

30 years ago you used to have to carry everything separately. Now you have a music player, phone, and camera all in one gadget plus internet access too.

And people are less private. They go on the internet and post extremely private and sometimes thoroughly mundane information for anybody to look at and then comment on. 30 years ago when you took film and pictures of family events, you and your immediate family were the only ones who saw it. Now total strangers can give their opinion on private things you did. No one cared what crackers you were eating or what show you had just watched.

Now we can “stream” TV shows from any era, all at once and created a new word just for it ,”binging”.

actually, my brother had the commodore 64 too, forgot about that, and also my friend from school had one as well, we had apple ][+’s for the little kids in the computer lab in school, and commodore PET 8086’s for the upper schoolers, sheesh i couldn’t get away from computers even back in the day

But most of the suits sold in 2013 were not slim fit suits by a long shot..

In the US, you mean? (I might have poorly understood the discussion you were having with Legion — let me know!)
The sharp suit, or blazer, the one that emphasizes shoulders and tapering form — no baggy trousers — is quite popular in Western Europe, to my eyes at least. I stare at men and their clothes and grooming a fair bit (!discreetly, discreetly!) and this slim or slimmish fit is everywhere, whether American cut, Italian cut, British cut, Spanish cut.

I believe there came a time when the “roomy” sweater and apple-shape blouson of the 1980s went and numbers of men seem to want a sleek suit — that thing of beauty and the mental armour that only a properly built and form-following — or at least “form-enhancing” — suit can gave them.
During the last 10 years or more Reiss, the meanswear chain seemed to hit a spot…because sexiness matters! Men seem to stand straighter in a suit, and look more authoritative.
Reiss (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=INMbc-RLMjQ)

I’d like to add that I rarely, if ever, see anyone wearing baggy tracksuits or shell suits anymore.

Piercing is much more common these days. It’s quite normal to see girls with rings and studs in various parts of their faces.
Tattoos are also now not unusual. They are now so standard I want to remove the ones I had done before it was popular — they just look “iffy” now! lol.

I remember, too, that people also used to wear huge spectacles.
Then, one day, I was mesmerized by the Germans and Dutch and Scandinavians who wore small, percisely cut, frameless glasses — suddenly being a 4-eyes was chic, and perhaps glasses were an accessory that those with 20/20 vision coveted!

These days glasses is another area of the fashion industry.
There are far more of these shops around than ever.

Knowing how dense some people can be, I’ve been convinced for quite a long while now that there are some wretched people out there using hand sanitizer in place of washing their hands. I just know that’s going on.
“

The worst is when someone sits in the stall next to you, and after finishing business, gets up, walks to the sink, looks in the mirror, and then FAILS TO WASH HIS HANDS! Then the bathroom pressure changes ever so slightly from the the door opening and closing as he walks right on out into the general office!!!!

I now memorize shoes in the stalls next to me. If “Mr. Wingtips” did not wash his hands, I can later identify exactly who the offending filth monger is, and steer clear of anything that he touches!

I think some people are disturbed at the though of touching taps and things in public bathrooms. I prefer to use a bottle of water, some shower gel from my hand bag and tissues to wash my hands in the street. Lol. (Followed by an antiaging hand cream with antioxidants and a high spf. And Gucci rush essential perfume oil on my wrists.)

I’m gonna get rid of my microwave and just reheat food on the stove soon. Radiation is a very real issue. It’s also important to turn off things like the TV when you’re not watching it. Have you read the maker’s diet, Legion?

“In a microwave oven, the water molecules in food are vibrated forcefully. This creates friction between the molecules and heats the food from the inside out.com In the process, the molecules are deformed into radiolytic compounds. Cooking also creates the compounds, but on a smaller scale. In Switzerland, researchers conducted experiments to see what effects eating microwaved foods has on the blood.com They discovered a decrease in white blood cells and hemoglobin, the material that delivers oxygen to the body tissues. Until more is known about microwave cooking, we recommend cooking the conventional way.”

LOL. When you said handwashing I like to died laughing. It reminds me of this particular bad habit that my daughter is now learning at school. Instead of having the kids wash their hands. They have decided that hand sanitizer is the alternative. It just kills me.

Mmm, not sure I’d say there’s NO “Bladerunner future.”
We may not have flying cars and Turing-level androids, but we do have a lot of stuff that would seem like sci-fi to our 1984 selves, especially taken all together.

We have:
• Newspapers that update while you hold them in your hand, complete with photos that move and talk (iPad)—this is a *classic* Future trope, only a few ticks below flying cars!
• Video billboards, another classic. Also “smart” ads that sense your presence and maybe even your demographic (!) and deliver customized content.
• a fricken SPACE STATION. I repeat: we built a large, permanent, habitable artificial satellite. It’s just up there, chillin. In space. People go live in it sometimes.
• A global pandemic with a 50% historical death rate, for which we have no cure. (HIV/AIDS. Which retro-you has never heard of, btw: it was first ID’d in 1984… but not until April!) This one’s a classic *dystopian* Future trope.
• Way more urbanites. Back then about a third of the world’s population lived in cities; now it’s more than half. That’s a 50% increase.
• More visible war. Media coverage is much more close-up than it was then, and with 24hr cable news, it’s MUCH more saturated. War is actually probably the same or less, but retro-you might think it was World War III at first.
• Video cameras everyfreakinwhere— as surveillance (dystopianFuture) and as consumer tech (shinyFuture)
• An active probe on the planet Mars, with a deployment sequence straight out of a movie.
• Crystal clear videophones— that fit in your pocket.
• Small noiseless electric cars everywhere.
• Cars that can park themselves.
• Thought-activated prosthetics.
• Voice-activated electronics at the consumer level; eg, you can tell your house to turn on some music and run you a bath.
• Lasers, y’all. Cheap and all over the place: in DVD players, in $5 laser pointers, in Kinkos to cut out your stickers, in salons so you don’t have to shave your hoo.
• Tech so advanced you can do heart surgery on a patient in another country. With lasers.

And maybe the most disorienting thing to a time-traveler: we’re not amazed by any of it! We’re like, *annoyed* when our handheld GPS-enabled videophones can’t direct us to the nearest wifi hotspot fast enough. Stupid phone. It’s been like, *seconds* already, wtf.

I’m just saying, even without flying cars I think 1984-Aba would be like
: U

Many of those things do not affect daily life. I tried to leave out anything I would only know about by reading the news or looking up statistics. So no Mars rovers, space stations or even voice-activated houses (no one I know lives in one). I do not know anyone who has a videophone or thought-activated prosthetics. Etc.

I left off Aids for the same reason. Sure, I would be shocked and horrified to find out that over 30 million people died of it in the past 30 years. BUT no one I knew in 1984 died of Aids. It is not like it wiped out half my family or something.

“nobody thought America would have a Black President thirty years later, nobody expected a Pope from the Americas.”

In the 1970s there was a novel about an American pope. In 1972 there was a film starring James Earl Jones about a black American president – “The Man”. In 1963, Robert Kennedy said there would be a black president in 40 years – by 2003.

“1. There was a video game called Jumpman? I’ll have to research that.

2. On the cartoon Inspector Gadget, which I watched as a child, is Penny’s computer book the fictional prototype for the laptop or notebook?

3. Who still has VCRs in their homes? I still do. 🙂

4. Somewhere in my house, Coleco Vision and the original NES are collecting dust. Does anyone else have past generation game systems from years ago?

5. Computers seem a lot cheaper today than they were back then. Weren’t their costs in the thousands range?”

Jumpman was a Commodore 64 game.

I still have a VCR!

Computers are cheaper. The Macintosh in 1984 was listed at $1950. That is $4400 in today’s money. The Commodore 64 was $650, if I remember correctly. That comes to $1450 now. And that does not even take into account the fact that the Mac had only 128K of memory and the Commodore 64 had 64K.

“Diskettes! Remember those huge 5 1/4 diskettes that computers used? You’d have to put in one to boot your computer, then another one to actually run it. And if it had 64k memory, you had a powerhouse!”

I remember that! And thought it was so cool. Because back then computers were not everywhere.

Something I wonder about is does the food taste different? Like they put sugar in spaghetti sauce now. Would you notice that?

I remember the first time I saw a picture of someone’s dog on the Internet. I was so thrilled. And amazed. That was back when I still kept bookmarks and emailed them to my friends. The last time I got a thrill like that was in 2006 when someone in Singapore blogged their lunch.

For me it is funny because I have to laugh to keep from crying or getting angry. I found out last year that the rooms that have attached bathrooms do not actually have sinks just the toilet. So I have to stay on her constantly about washing her hands as school has allowed her to believe that hand sanitizer fixes it all.

Now I naively thought that everyone washed their hands. I got a rude awakening on several occasions of witnessing otherwise in restaurants, but the biggest impact turned out to be when a female stopped me and said “don’t open the door with your hands use a paper towel.” She explained that people who don’t wash their hands leave their germs on the door and you touch it and then carry it with you.

I’m not sure of this.
I’ve encountered more people who are “bored” or feel “dumbed down” by too much television (reality shows, celebrity culture, etc.) than years ago, and don’t use the television like a background “wallpaper” to their lives. There’s more tv than 30 years ago, but perhaps people are less sucked in by it?

Firstly, because building materials have changed — for instance, in the 1980s ago a house’s glass window came as single glazed or double-glazed, maybe even triple-glazed. Now glass can be self-clearning, or heat-emitting because of Krypton, or Argon, gas. Krypton cuts out the need for other forms of heating.
Glass is tougher and it can be folded and fall flush with walls.
It can even be the wall, the door, the ceiling.
There are therefore more glass-encased “outdoor rooms” than before:

There was a time in the 1980s when architectural drawings and models was the only way to see and experience the look and feel of a building.
But, you simply can’t tell beforehand how something big, like sunlight and shadow, will play and change with the shape of a building inside, for instance.
A model or a drawin will still necessary, but digital technology allows a designer to “experience” the building before it is created. It’s more than 3D, it’s interactive, and breaks down the barrier about what can be designed and what can, or should, be built.

Entertainment, in general, has been blind-sided by the rise of the internet. Music and film has suffered tremendously. TV seems to be overtaking cinema now, though. The wire, The Sopranos, S-x and the city, Game of thrones, Mad men, Boardwalk empire. These are big budget quality productions that (once upon a time) would have been limited to the big screen.

Entertainment, in general, has been blind-sided by the rise of the internet. Music and film has suffered tremendously. TV seems to be overtaking cinema now, though. The wire, The Sopranos, S-x and the city, Game of thrones, Mad men, Boardwalk empire. These are big budget quality productions that (once upon a time) would have been limited to the big screen.

Entertainment has certainly been transformed by the Internet. In some ways for the better. Independent artist can now publish their own work in their chosen medium directly to their audience. Musicians, film makers, writers can all bypass the conservative filter of commercial publishers, distributors and record companies. More adventurous work proliferates.

Of course, the downside is that that quality control is unreliable. Fortunately, the online equivalent of word-of-mouth recommendation and review helps.

I have a strong dislike for most television and most contemporary mainstream cinema.

As a writer I rejoice in the growth of indie publishing. I’m even happy to tolerate the tsunami of junk material. That will fade away and the quality output will endure.

I absolutely agree. I think people are still getting used to the word of mouth route. Young adults, like myself, are in many ways still used to being lazy and spoon fed music, as we’re not of the vinyl (spend a day at the record store digging out, listening to, and then purchasing your chosen selection) era. There’s been a gap of adjustment time.

Huuuh! Are you telling me you’re not a Mad men, Game of thrones, or Boardwalk empire fan? How could you? I’ve simply never heard of such a thing. Well I neva! Lol

I like how the internet has introduced me to Swedish and Danish crime and politics dramas. Eg:
Wallander. The Killing. The Bridge. Borgen.
Also the French crime thriller, “Engrenages”(Spiral).

What I like about it is that none of it is sensationalistic, but none of it is predictable.
All of them feature troubled people dealing with trouble. Women are centre-stage, but they don’t play “women”, they just struggle with life and work and family. All well filmed, not too much dialogue, adult, dark and complex but easy to understand. And funny! Just replay!

Before this, you could only find something as satisfying in “World Cinema”, if at all.

[…]Huuuh! Are you telling me you’re not a Mad men, Game of thrones, or Boardwalk empire fan? How could you? I’ve simply never heard of such a thing. Well I neva! Lol

LOL, Well, I think the last thing I watched consistently on TV was probably the first series of ‘The Killing’ in Danish, which I thought was very good. I watched a couple of episodes of the American remake out of curiosity and hated it.

{ Aside: why does the USA have to remake these things in American English? Would US audiences really not watch if they had to read subtitles? It seems from a UK perspective that a huge proportion of TV shows imported into the USA get remade – often despite being in English to begin with. Seems a bit insulting/patronising to the American audience to imply that they can’t handle anything that hasn’t been sanitised and Americanised for them. }

Good drama is, in the UK, struggling to be seen amongst superficial, contrived, dumbed-down reality shows. Lazy people are making lazy TV for other lazy people.

I sometimes take some notice of stuff my wife watches, but mostly I prefer to read, write or play music.

One change for which I am very grateful is the amount of music tuition available for free on the internet. If that had been available when I started to play guitar in 1971, I’d be much a much better musician than I am now. It is no wonder there are so many great young musicians about.

In fact, as an educational tool in many fields, the internet is terrific. Not perfect, but still amazing.
……………………………………………………….
Very true, you can y0u()be anything and find a tutorial, no matter what it is.

….I think the last thing I watched consistently on TV was probably the first series of ‘The Killing’ in Danish, which I thought was very good. I watched a couple of episodes of the American remake out of curiosity and hated it.

buddhuu, did you see Season 3 of the American version of this series?
This one does not imitate the original at all. In this series, the detectives work on a case of a missing teenager, and the deaths of “tough” street kids.
It moves slow, and colourlessly. Hilarious and horrifying.

All I can say is that this series turned out to be not only compulsive and viewing, but unbearably heartbreaking.
Not only very good, but simply fantastic, television.

“I’ve encountered more people who are “bored” or feel “dumbed down” by too much television (reality shows, celebrity culture, etc.) than years ago, and don’t use the television like a background “wallpaper” to their lives. There’s more tv than 30 years ago, but perhaps people are less sucked in by it?”—-Absolutely amazing observation and one that I have found to be very true. We have several Tv shows, but very few of them are even worth looking at.

I don’t touch the bathroom doors either I use a paper towel, but more bathrooms are getting rid of paper towels and having hand dryers which I’ve heard are not sanitary. People that don’t wash their hands are nasty, and they touch the door so that is why I either use my shirt or a paper towel to open the door.

There’s an app for everything and anything today. In an effort to reduce congestion a district in London began installing parking sensors so drivers can use tan app to find empty parking spots. There is even an app to tell drivers where bad neighborhoods are so they can avoid being victims of criminal activity, that sounds kind of racist to me, but technology is starting to become fascinating to me.

Youtube hits can make a random nobody into an instant celebrity with so many hits. It doesn’t matter if a certain music artist or any celebrity has any talent, if they have enough “Twitter followers. Celebrities are now considered something called a Brand.

Youtube hits can make a random nobody into an instant celebrity with so many hits. It doesn’t matter if a certain music artist or any celebrity has any talent, if they have enough “Twitter followers. Celebrities are now considered something called a Brand.

What an insight!
Fame used to be something that was for the few and in-between. A famous person used to be an exceptional person. You had to actually do something or be something special to get fame. Now there are people who are famous for being “famous”.

“I’ve encountered more people who are “bored” or feel “dumbed down” by too much television (reality shows, celebrity culture, etc.) than years ago, and don’t use the television like a background “wallpaper” to their lives. There’s more tv than 30 years ago, but perhaps people are less sucked in by it?”—-Absolutely amazing observation and one that I have found to be very true. We have several Tv shows, but very few of them are even worth looking at.

Yes indeed – that’s the thing: if you can find good stuff then watch it… But WTF is most of the remaining rubbish about? Why do people not demand more substance?

@ mary burrell

Youtube hits can make a random nobody into an instant celebrity with so many hits. It doesn’t matter if a certain music artist or any celebrity has any talent, if they have enough “Twitter followers. Celebrities are now considered something called a Brand.

You are, of course, quite right. But YouTube also gives us some artists who display real talent – or, at least, real integrity. There’s a young man in the UK who goes by the name NxtGen or MC NxtGen: he’s not the most talented rapper in the world, but he is polically aware, determined and he totally gives a sh|t about UK politics. Even if his views did not agree with mine, I would respect him for the obvious sincerity and passion in his work.

@ mstoogood4yall

I don’t touch the bathroom doors either I use a paper towel, but more bathrooms are getting rid of paper towels and having hand dryers which I’ve heard are not sanitary. People that don’t wash their hands are nasty, and they touch the door so that is why I either use my shirt or a paper towel to open the door.

Did you write this or did I? Looks like something straight out of my mind! LOL.

I might be looking at the past with rose tinted glasses but I remember having a lot more freedom as a child in the late 80s/early 90s compared with the kids today.

I remember catching public transport, cycling and just playing games with my friends without any supervision at all. This was the case in Australia and also in Singapore when we lived there for a few years. Mum would tell me to ‘Be careful’ and then let me go off exploring for hours.

My youngest sister is still a kid and she’s not allowed to play outside unsupervised because my parents are so afraid of predators. Her childhood seems to be a lot more restricted and less free than mine. She spends a lot more time playing with electronic devices and a lot less time playing imaginary games and socialising with other children.

I don’t think youngsters of today walk, run, exercise, or explore the natural world and hang out in the fresh air as much as the generation before them.
Partly for the reason you give, and partly because there seem to be far, far more cars than before. Why walk when you can sit?

I have heard 8 and 9 year olds say they are “too tired” to walk to the shop with their parents!

Oh you’re absolutely right – every family seems to have about two cars these days.

It’s a vicious cycle – because there are too many cars on the road, Governments build bigger roads to ease traffic, and then there’s not enough money to invest in quality public transport like trains/trams etc which would actually get cars of the roads in the first place!

I also think the whole fear of predators/crime thing is driven by the media. In Sydney (Australia) crime rates have actually dropped significantly since the 80s – but you wouldn’t think this if you watched the news every night. Almost every leading story is designed to give the impression that there’s a law and order crisis when we’re actually safer than ever before!

This is probably a bit of a conspiracy theory but really, TV producers have a vested interest in keeping us indoors consuming their garbage.

Yes!
Consuming their garbage, keeping their sponsors in business, justifying their salaries — and feeding the paranoia about paedophilia.

There was a time I think a child’s family or guardian could be more affectionate, but I think more people are self-conscious about if it is “appropriate” now, even when it’s their own child, or grandchild, etc.

This seems more so for male parents, teachers, etc., although women aren’t excluded from this. Adults have to take care when speaking to children they don’t know, even. Because that means that adult could be a weirdo for doing so. No playing with kids. No watching, and no taking of photos of them.
That has become “suspicious” conduct.

…because there are too many cars on the road, Governments build bigger roads to ease traffic, and then there’s not enough money to invest in quality public transport like trains/trams etc which would actually get cars of the roads in the first place!

This vicious cycle is an inter-connected system. Keeping cars on the road and the oil industry going…like the acrylic acid, propylene glycol and alchohol (isopropyl) in hand sanitizers: petro-chemicals that are necessary to make this unnecessary product.

^ Yes, it saddens me to read that Los Angeles had the largest rail network in the world until the 1940s-50s. And although it indirectly created pollution, it was not at street level where people walked and breathed. What replaced it was a complete mess.

The US was not the only place that made this decision. I am also saddened by Malaysia. The government pushed the development of the local car industry and none of the major cities have a decent transportation system and there is still no efficient fast ground transportation between cities. You can easily look at Singapore to gauge what a different transportation policy would have produced.

It’s the same deal in Sydney, although I think a lot of the motivation here has been the Australian car manufacturing industry.

Now that car manufacturing has basically died in Australia (Ford/Holden are both pulling out of Aus entirely) maybe things will change. Although the road logistics (trucking) industry is still really influential so I won’t be holding my breath!

@ jefe

Are there any cities in the US with really good public transport infrastructure? I wonder if any have gone the other way since the 80s – i.e. from being full of cars to being a city of trains and trams.

I hear you re: the whole paranoia about normal friendly interactions. I remember a really lovely old man that lived next door to us for a little while in the late 80s. He was a really kind soul and used to give me cookies and tell me stories about his own granddaughter. Nowadays I think people would find it very suspicious if an unrelated man were to talk to a little girl.

There was an incident at a beach in Sydney recently where a man was questioned by police for taking photos of his daughter building sandcastles. Obviously child protection has to come first but I think it’s terrible if fathers, mothers, uncles etc can’t even interact normally with their own children in public.

LA also has the most complex (and congested) freeway system in the world, and is the the hoe of the first freeway. The two systems existed in tandem for many decades, and worked in compliment one to the other. Both have their niche but eventually cars became predominant in LA because of the great distances. Unlike New York, LA had the space to sprawl, and so spread out accordingly rather than stacking up. It just became impractical to be able to build and maintain trains to everywhere! Cars were cheaper, and easier.

The problem was that, in a place like Southern California, more and more people wanted to move to the warm, mild, climate of the southern Pacific Coast. And the roads became more and more congested. Meanwhile the powers that be allowed light rail system to fall into disrepair (not planning for the future). So now in LA, we’re scrambling to rebuild a mass transportation system again.

THIS is my worry about mass transportation. When TPTB begin talking about driving an individual car like it’s some sort of sin against Gaia, and seem to be directing more and more average people away from individualized travel freedoms, it begins to look more and more like a detour to disaster.

In 2014 I can go outside, get in my car, go to my bank, get some cash, and without telling a soul, I can drive my car to many places in the U.S. and nobody will even know where I’ve gone. But in the cattle chute that is modern mass transit, I am issued a ‘Tap Card’ (which is linked directly to me) that I am required to use on the Metro. Every time I use the train, it is recorded, in fact all of my trips can be brought up on the computer within an instant. Every single place that I go is forever pubic record.

Raise your hand if you think they is good idea?
Raise your hand agin if you think this really about “the environment?”

@ King. I live in L.A. and have learned how to travel around based on what I know about the traffic patterns. California has a car culture.

Some freeways like the 405 and the 10 always have heavy traffic. What LA is doing is taking the car pool lanes and turning them into Fast Track lanes where you pay to drive on them. I have a responder in my car and it charges me when I use those lanes. That can be used to track me as well.

We have some light rail and it could be improved by building lines to LAX or the beach.

Californian’s voted for high speed rail to connect LA to San Francisco but it turns out that it’s not really high speed rail. The problem is because it not high speed it will take forever to get their so it’s likely people will fly instead. So were going to spend billions building something that people aren’t going to use enough to pay for itself..It was sold as progressive and good for the environment but it seems more likely it’s intended to create jobs for politically connected corporations.

It is hard to drive anywhere and not be tracked. Their are cameras set up along freeways that take pictures of license plates all day long. Cameras in public and private business are common. Your cell phone can be used to locate you. Every scan from a credit or debit card leaves a trail.

George Orwell described a world where the government tracks your every move. We are way beyond anything that he ever imagined. Every social media post you ever made can be used if the government wanted to build a case against you.

It’s not only cameras and cards that track.
Some of this happens in outter space, from satellites.
It could be the navigation system (GPS) that you may have installed in your car to help you find your way.

What LA is doing is taking the car pool lanes and turning them into Fast Track lanes where you pay to drive on them.”

@ Michael Jon Barker

I refuse to buy a Fast Track transponder! These roads were already built using TAX money! I’m not going to pay for them again and again! It’s just a way for the rich to get around while the poor spend hours in traffic. Mark my words, supply and demand will eventually raise the rates until you will no longer be able to afford it. Only the elite will have access to those lane$.

Californian’s voted for high speed rail to connect LA to San Francisco but it turns out that it’s not really high speed rail. The problem is because it not high speed it will take forever to get their so it’s likely people will fly instead.

Everybody know that project will never work. It’s just a way for money to exchange hands for a while. I doubt if it will ever be finished. It’s just a financial channel being used (politically_ in the short term.

It is hard to drive anywhere and not be tracked. Their are cameras set up along freeways that take pictures of license plates all day long.”

It was a little expensive, (on ebay) but quite impenetrable to cell towers and radio waves. Oh, I’m afraid, that can’t be tracked either. It’s not that I even have anywhere so “secret” to go. I just don’t like the idea of accepting this matter-of-fact universal tracking as if it’s somehow normal and acceptable. People have the RIGHT to privacy.

King, so you put those devices in the sharps can.
What is the material that makes it impenetrable to tracking?

@ Bulanik

It’s lined with lead to prevent radiation from leaking out. (or in this case in) it’s made for the syringes that are contaminated with low-energy gamma and beta radiation. I tested by phone inside of the container and it get no bars.

The shield is constructed of steel lined with .125″ (.32 cm) lead and .0625″ (1.6 cm) aluminum.

I actually tried to find a lead pig but I would have to get a custom one made for it to be the right size to fit my phone. I happened upon the radiological waste/transport container on Ebay by luck. I know It’s a bit bulky though. I think in the end I’ll just have a pig made to my specifications.

RFIDs (radio frequency identification) devices are more prevalent now than before, and many of them are no bigger than a grain of rice.
They can be present unseen and where least expected.”

Yes, I agree. I hear that they are in some denominations of money. The best I can do is put all suspect items behind the lead shield.

But much depends on if you are being actively surveilled, or passively surveilled. I’m sure if you have people truly tracking YOU specifically, then you cannot escape being tracked, and that is good. I’m perfectly happy that some people are not left to roam around to secretly do whatever they want. But those people are suspects, operatives, of persons of interest.

It’s the passive surveilled that I’m trying to defeat. The kind where they just stack up information on everybody so that if they ever feel they need to look at any one individual closely ,then they suddenly have every detail of your life in front of them. That is unwarranted. If we have not done anything to warrant surveilled, then we should not be spied upon “just in case.”

However, that kind of blanket surveilled is less rigorous and less defined than in the case of the active agent looking over your shoulder because you are deemed a clear and present threat to security. So transponders, listening devices, etc, can be used (particularly if you crossing international borders. But I think within your own country, you should have the right to move about freely without being “recorded” for some future court case or set-up.

But I think within your own country, you should have the right to move about freely without being “recorded” for some future court case or set-up.

Yes, King, especially if one lives in a small country, especially one with a history of occupation and security breaches — as a foreigner.

In fact, I used to care little and I paid little mind to how much information was shared among institutions about EVERYONE. It took awhile to realize WHY many people guarded their privacy so fiercely from each other, and only then begun to actually see the exclusions and moniroring reserved for non-nationals. You realize then how vulnerable you are, and how invasive these measures are…

“The kind where they just stack up information on everybody so that if they ever feel they need to look at any one individual closely ,then they suddenly have every detail of your life in front of them. That is unwarranted. If we have not done anything to warrant surveilled, then we should not be spied upon “just in case.”

***********

King,

I agree. We live in a bonafide police state.

However, much of this spying is also being done for corporate interests. Consumer markets such as advertising, banking and the health insurance industry are all invested in the surveillance industries as much as they are legally able – to acquire data on individual (and groups of) consumers in order to increase their control AND corporate earnings. New technologies (tools) are ALWAYS exploited by those with the most money and power to do so.

These laws//rules/regulations BENEFIT the corporations way more than they do the people. That’s what we get for living in the most free country in the world! LOL The freedom — THEY HAVE — to do whatever (often oppressive things) they want to do to us, as long as it’s profitable for them.

Yes. We are.
Perhaps I’ve been mincing my words. Maybe I should’ve said earlier we’re living in the time of the PANOPTICON. http://cartome.org/panopticon1.htm
The surveillance that has penetrated our lives are the building blocks of dictatorship. No exaggeration.

East Germany was mentioned earlier, a country where everyone spied on each other, lived under suspicion, lived under a warning and where everyone was potentially “suspicious”. That was socialism, supposedly The System which makes people live under discipline and punishment.

Fast forward to capitalist places, where capitalism is crumbling.
There are always decent people who have nothing to hide. But all of us have our voting habits, thoughts and activities followed, tracked and stored.
For what? our safety and well-being and happiness?
As if we should TRUST our governments for all of such!

The Germans I know DO NOT trust their government and they have every right not to. They know that given half the chance, EVERY place they enter will have face recognition, EVERY movement they make will be tracked, and EVERY object they own or buy or touch will have “a digital layer”, because everywhere, all the time, the “state Trojan” will be inserting itself, watching, listening and keeping it in a dossier….just waiting for a day when the citizen can be hurt with it.
Government Spyware used in Germany:http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Online-Durchsuchung

Like a person’s identity can’t be stolen…mistakes made, lies told?
Identity theft didn’t happen to me, but it happened to someone very close to me. When that happens, it can, and does, takes a long time to have identity restored.
In fact, I mince my words when I say that in the meanwhile, it was hell.
It can happen to anyone and it doesn’t ever, EVER, go fully away.

“Dissendent” or “Muslim”, for example, are not trigger words like:
*terrorist”,
*hacker* or
*child pornography*,
If a person has the misfortune to be merely indirectly or accidently associated with these words, then, Adios!
ANYONE’s civil liberties will be thrown under the bus.
It doesn’t matter if the person in question has nothing to do with any of that.
They can be violated all the same. Punishment is just around the corner.

as far as i know, the silver static bags you get the actual EZ-PASS in, or for example a hard drive or some other electronic component will block the signal for toll road transponder devices, i assume it would work for a cell phone

FWIW, everybody knows everything, theoretically you could root an android to disable the gps, but that would be recompiling the whole phone’s operating system, i am sure someone has thought of this before

It is the same here in the UK. Surveillance increases, legal restrictions on liberty increase, protections against abuse of power by government and by law enforcement and intelligence agencies gradually disappear.

The apathy of most people is almost understandable. When one shakes off the blinkers and looks around it’s a pretty scary landscape.

I know the UK a bit, though I’ve lived for somewhile in the ROI.
You didn’t actually say this, but I’m not sure if I agree that apathy as always understandable.. Some say apathy comes out of sheer laziness.
I don’t think it’s all laziness, though.

Is apathy a response to too much stimulation / stress? Is it because people are overwhelmed by too much information and stimulation? I agree it’s easy to feel “excluded” in today’s over-surveilled world, but apathy always leads to bigger problems in my experience.

Remember hearing that during genocides, communal violence and so on, that there were different kinds of people? They were:
the Perpetrator,
the Victim,
the Healer, and,
the Bystander.
I’m putting things oversimplistically, of course, but — the Bystanders were the ones who didn’t care and let the worst happen.
Perhaps fear is the reason behind apathy .

Bulanik, thanks very much for the steers to those threads. I’ll go catch up. 🙂

This is the kind of thing that fires me up. My blog complains about the apathy that reigns despite the astonishing abuses that go on around us, and at the same time my FB friends think I’m eccentric because I rant.

Are there any cities in the US with really good public transport infrastructure? I wonder if any have gone the other way since the 80s – i.e. from being full of cars to being a city of trains and trams.

2 cities steadfastly opposed building interstate highways through their downtowns in the 60s-70s: Washington, DC and San Francisco. In order to pass through either of those 2 cities, you must either go completely around them, or travel on city streets to pass through them. They elected to divert their transportation money away from highways and into mass rail transit (hence BART and METRO). SF still has street cars and cable cars and allows people to take bicycles on their CALtrain. DC now has the 2nd busiest mass transit system in the USA, trailing only New York City. Its population doubles on weekdays, and that would not be possible without mass transit. Larger metro areas like Chicago, LA, Dallas, HOuston, Philadelphia, etc. do not come close. They also have a large bike rental system and have been rebuilding a streetcar system (the original one was dismantled in 1962).

Boston has always been a relatively transit oriented city (by US standards) given its compact downtown and high student population. But it discovered the interstate highway built in the early 70s that spliced their downtown was a grave mistake. It cutoff downtown from the harbour and waterfront. They tore it down about 10 years ago and resurfaced with streets and parks.

Agreed, but just so as not to insult those who are living more oppressive stages of police states around the world, we should stipulate that we are living in the beginnings of a surveillance state, which is precursor to a more oppressive full police state. But one leads inexorably to the other like fire leads to ashes.

However, much of this spying is also being done for corporate interests. Consumer markets such as advertising, banking and the health insurance industry are all invested in the surveillance industries…”

Do you believe that the corporations and the government are truly different things?

Nothing much has changed for Black people in this wicked country. We had our rights won by the 1980s from the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s and 1970s. The only difference for Blacks in the 2010s is that there is technology for us to use such as IPADs, IPhones, cell phones and laptops.

Economically, socially and politically, we still lag behind our White counterparts. Blacks still go to segregated school from White kids, really I am not lying. My friend to me that she read in Ebony magazine that 74% of Black children still go to schools in inner cities with less funding than White schools. Only 12% of Black eight grade boys read on their grade levels. Black unemployment is 13% compared to the national average of about 7%-8%. We still suffer from housing discrimination, racial profiling and racial stereotypes. I can go on and on about this but I have to go to bed.

Slim done right. We can’t see the (full) silhouette of the jacket but it would be in proportion to the pants, of course. The tie is too broad, I think. It is already loud yellow, no need to make it broad too. He is not wearing a belt, which I usually think of us as improper, but beltless seems okay in this example.

The look works because the gentleman, 1) wears it with elan, and, 2) his complexion is beautiful against the grey and the brights.
Lustrous grey against bronze skin is always elegant.

I am not sure if the suit is right for his body type, though.
I think the tie could be slimmer or the structure of the UPPER part of the suit broader. One or the other.
The jacket looks like an English “hacking” jacket — 2 flapped pockets on the right, cut on the diagonal. This suit has sharper label peaks than most of those though, and therefore sleeker. I wonder how the jacket would look if the shoulders had been bigger but just as slim on the torso and waist?
The trousers shouldn’t be cuffed on a man who is not particularly tall.
I feel the illusion of height has been lost with this look.

Wondering, too, if 4 patterns work in such close proximity – kerchief, label, shirt, tie? I think the limit of 3 different patterns is the cut off before it gets too busy. Mixing 3 patterns is good but it’s a question of scale and pattern size.

A beard on this gent would be a thing of beauty.
No need for the tie pin.

GPS systems to help navigate while driving or walking. In health care, Non invasive laser and robotic surgery. Lithotripsy, laparoscopy. We now have DNA testing to use in cases of sexual assault. There are test in paternity cases.

2)his complexion is beautiful against the grey and the brights.
Lustrous grey against bronze skin is always elegant.

Hmm, I hadn’t thought of that cherie. All of a sudden, I feel I am in urgent need of a grey suit. 🙂

• Yes, fuller in the shoulders is a good idea for him. He looks vertical with little shape.

• The more I look the more I see that tie as needing a counter balance, in terms of colour and it’s broadness. Possible solution: Bluer shoes. Shoes that are very noticiably blue. It could be carried off because the tie is so richly golden. (Narrower tie, already mentioned.)

• The trousers shouldn’t be cuffed on a man who is not particularly tall.
Yes, you’re right. What minimum height, do you think, is tall enough to pull off cuffs?
I usually think about cuffs in relation to how heavy (or not) the foot wear will be.
Heavy footwear, yes to cuffs. Light footwear, no to cuffs.

• Wondering, too, if 4 patterns work in such close proximity – kerchief, label, shirt, tie?

I’d lose the pocket square, it seems distracting. The lapel pin is very cool–Bumble bee? Moth?

Yeah, some things were done with this look that are just gimmicky, the no socks was one of them. Maybe if the suit were linen, one could get away with no socks, but it ain’t linen …

The double breast has been amazingly restated. I think it was a year ago that I saw it make it’s “comeback” and yeah Denzel was one of the first models that I saw in it. He did look very good. The double breast is still very risky; the jacket must be cut just right so that somehow it still looks cool and not cheesy. Those waifish kids on the runway can’t carry off a DB. I’ve noticed that the designers always model the DB on men who look like MEN!

The double breast has been amazingly restated. I think it was a year ago that I saw it make it’s “comeback” and yeah Denzel was one of the first models that I saw in it. He did look very good. The double breast is still very risky; the jacket must be cut just right so that somehow it still looks cool and not cheesy.”

Possible solution: Bluer shoes. Shoes that are very noticiably blue. It could be carried off because the tie is so richly golden. (Narrower tie, already mentioned.)

Midnight blue shoes would be a good, safe choice, but imo, a mid-tan shoe might be better (for contrast with the grey suit and tonal play with the gold tie) -But he would have to wear a mid-brown belt to carry it off.
Perhaps a pointy brogue or a loafer in mid tan.

What minimum height, do you think, is tall enough to pull off cuffs?
Heavy footwear, yes to cuffs. Light footwear, no to cuffs.

6ft. Too much detailing in a limited space can be distracting.
But…the individual man’s proportions come into play.
A man can be tall and have short legs and a shorter man can have longish legs in relation to his torso. In men’s clothing, I think no matter what the height or the build, the desired illusion is the V shape — wide shoulders, narrow hips, and as much height as possible. No matter what height, a man should stand tall and upright. http://media.male-extravaganza.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/david-gandy_2_txkaps.jpg

I don’t think footwear matters that much with wearing cuffs on trousers because the eye takes in the whole picture: shoulders, mid-section, legs, shoes.
That suit you linked could work just as well with a simple turtle neck and kerchief, and button the jacket — and the wearer might look taller, cuffs or not.
Personally, I think if you want to mix it up, wearing trousers tailored from a darker, plain block colour, always works to give the illusion of length:

I like how the model here, Paul Weller, wears a grey check with simplicity. I think it’s the shape and cut. That’s what counts when a suit is accessorized.
Take a look it’s at around 00.40. It’s only a minute long, so you might miss it.
(Mr Weller is modelling with his daughter, a child from his marriage with soul singer Dee C Lee.)
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oE8_x4UIvsM)

The lapel pin is very cool–Bumble bee? Moth?

Cool! It really gives individuality. Some of finest silversmithing out there is done by Polish jewelers: amber set in siliver in the likeness of beetles and frogs… As I was saying to King earlier on about men’s tailoring: tailoring has fused more with fashion, and suits are less formal and conforming than they were 30 years ago (King didn’t answer so I don’t know what he thinks about that.) I bellieve men wear jewelry more too, and perhaps feel freer in adding a bright, individual touch far more now than years ago.

This is now the age of technology, for the past 30 or 40 years people were able to work in industrial jobs and weren’t college graduates and probably just graduated from high school and were able to secure jobs that paid well. Now one must be educated about all the modern technology of this age. If one does not get on top of technology it will get on top of them.

It does not serve young people today to think they can make a financial killing job-wise without first attaining viable degree and / or technical training. When I was coming along, even a Bachelors was not deemed sufficient; a Masters, and most especially an MBA, was considered basic / entry level.

These days it seems that a sizeable number of young people are going on to pursue their Doctorate degree, something which I myself considered a worthy though unnecessary pursuit, career-wise — a luxury, really.

This is now the age of technology, for the past 30 or 40 years people were able to work in industrial jobs and weren’t college graduates and probably just graduated from high school and were able to secure jobs that paid well.

I think that was mainly during the period 1945 – 1984. By the mid-80s, those jobs were starting to dry up due to
– foreign competition and offshore production
– break-up of the unions
– computer / tech jobs expansion throughout the 80s.

It is mostly the people born before WWII that could become middle class doing a trade or industrial work without a college degree.

we got our first one in the mid-late 70s. Took one up to college. I worked in a Chinese restaurant 1982-1985, and rice cookers were used. How did that become new in 2014? I would describe it as something that has not changed much. The ones today look almost the same as the ones in 1984.

I like how the model here, Paul Weller, wears a grey check with simplicity. I think it’s the shape and cut. That’s what counts when a suit is accessorized.
Take a look it’s at around 00.40. It’s only a minute long, so you might miss it.
(Mr Weller is modelling with his daughter, a child from his marriage with soul singer Dee C Lee.)